


The Adventure Of The Norman Peculiar (1879)

by Cerdic519



Series: Elementary 221B [23]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Destiel - Freeform, F/M, Johnlock - Freeform, Kidnapping, M/M, Period-Typical Racism, Physical Abuse, Slavery, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-04-06
Packaged: 2018-10-15 09:39:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10554144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: Case 16: Watson learns the hard way that his so-called 'betters' are prepared to submit to their basest instincts.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Mentioned elsewhere as 'the affair at the Tankerville Club'. A warning; this was one of the darkest of our early tales, shining a light on the inhumanity of some so-called 'humans'.

One of the many advantages to having Holmes as a friend was that it solved one small but important societal problem for me. As a doctor who treated some of the people in 'high society', it was considered only fitting that I should have a membership of at least one of London's top gentlemen's clubs, because the richer people that I treated expected to be able to find the name of one of such establishment on my calling-card. Had I not been able to fulfill that societal nicety, I doubt that they would have continued using my offices. Which was all well and good, except the fees for being a member of these were frankly eye-watering, and my already grumbling bank-manager would have had a conniption had I paid them.

Holmes, fortunately, solved that problem, as his father had insisted on his having the highest class of membership at three clubs, and at two of them, that also included the right to associate membership for any gentlemen friends. Hence I was able to have two illustrious names on my 'Doctor John Watson, M.D.' cards, and to talk to my patients about them as if I did not only go to each of them once in a blue moon. 

All right, I occasionally accompanied Holmes to Benfield's on a very small number of Thursdays because of the pie. But we always walked there from the house, so despite what some snarky blue-eyed genius was prone to comment about my having two desserts on those days, that did not count. Besides, it was pie. Not dessert.

Shut up!

+~+~+

It was shortly after our return from Cornwall that I was called out to old Lord Merioneth, who had collapsed during a game of cards at the Tankerville Club, a very plush establishment (not one of mine, I should add) on the banks of the River Thames in Chelsea. The doorman had looked at me most pityingly, and seemed quite disbelieving that I was a doctor come to treat someone in his lofty establishment. Fortunately I was eventually admitted, and Lord Merioneth needed little more than some reassurance and some stomach powders.

I thought nothing more of the matter until two days later, when Sergeant Henriksen called round. I had assumed that it was because Holmes wanted to brief him about the resolution of the Cornish case (and not because, by an utterly incredible and totally amazing coincidence, it was Mrs. Hellingly's sponge-cake day!), but to my surprise, he wanted to talk to me.

“You were seen entering the Tankerville Club, doctor”, he said. I looked at him curiously.

“I had to treat a patient there”, I said, wondering what this was all about. “Why do you ask?”

The policeman hesitated.

“It may be something or nothing”, he said, “but there's a few fellows from my own Dutch West Indies - not my island - that live along the riverside in Stepney. I know Eddy, one of them; he's a copper in the area. He came to me yesterday about that club, and he thinks something odd is going on there.”

I wondered as to why an East Ender would be concerned about a West End club. Indeed, I sometimes thought that the two parts of London functioned almost as two quite separate cities.

“Odd how, precisely?” Holmes asked, his head tilting to one side as it always did when he was puzzled.

“In the past year, three of his neighbours just left without telling anyone”, Henriksen said. “And the odd thing; they were all young, single men. The last of them, Ben, mentioned he'd been offered a job at the Tankerville Club, just days before he left. The house was all sold and everything proper, but Eddy says that it wasn't like him.”

“Someone is kidnapping black men from the East End?” I said dubiously. “To what end?”

“That's the weird thing”, Henriksen said, scratching his gleaming bald pate (seriously, did he actually polish it?). “I wanted to talk to Mr. Holmes here about it, because I felt he'd explain it better that The Donald.”

I could sympathize. I could not imagine it being easy to explain such a nebulous matter to Henriksen's boss, Inspector Fraser Macdonald.

“What is the problem?” Holmes asked our friend.

“I was told that it was something peculiar”, the sergeant said. “All I know is that the local lads at Chelsea station aren't allowed inside, even if a crime has been reported. They have to get permission first.”

“Ah”, Holmes said knowingly. 

I glared at him.

“Please explain”, I said, not at all testily. He chuckled.

“The Tankerville Club must be the 'peculiar' that I once read existed somewhere in West London”, he said. “It is normally a church term, but here, it refers to a part of England that is not legally England.”

Well, that cleared things up - not! He smiled at my obvious annoyance.

“The Tankerville Club was founded in honour of the family of the same name”, he explained. “The current earl, a Mr. Charles Bennet to give him his proper name, is descended from a line who, before the Conquest, used to hold lands in Tancarville, which is in Normandy. Obviously at some time in the past, the land where the club stands was made a possession of the family as vassals of someone other than the King of England. Their charter must never have been revoked, so therefore it is legally not part of England.”

“So a part of Chelsea is French?” I asked, surprised. 

“Maybe”, he said. “Its questionable legal status means that the police have to tread warily, especially given the difficult situation in France just now.”

That was all too true, I thought. It was less than a decade since German troops had marched through Paris, and the once-mighty French nation utterly humiliated by the new power in Europe Bismarck's Germany, losing the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine to them. There had since been some suggestions of a warming in Anglo-French relations, which any mishandling of this matter would not help. 

“You think the nob himself is involved?” Henriksen asked. He had, I knew, a low opinion of the nobility, regarding them as merely criminals who knew how to operate above the law (I suspected that he was quite right in some cases). Holmes shook his head. 

“A member of the Privy Council, and a most honourable man”, he said. “No, whatever is going on at the club that bears his name, I am sure that he has no part of it. But he may be important to remedying matters, if they need remedying. Thank you for bringing this to our attention, Henriksen. I shall look into it.”

+~+~+

It was One Of Those Days. Henriksen had barely left when we had a second visitor. A far less welcome one.

“Bacchus”, Holmes said coolly. “To what do we owe the 'pleasure'?”

His tone clearly implied that there was an unspoken 'dis'' before the 'pleasure'. The lounge-lizard did not even take a seat, and stared haughtily down his nose at his younger brother.

“You are making inquiries into the Tankerville Club”, he said. 

“I shall be”, Holmes said.

“You must cease them.”

“Why?”

The sadist in me enjoyed moments like these. Mr. Bacchus Holmes was clearly used to being obeyed in everything he demanded of the people around him, and someone not jumping to do what he wanted was clearly both unwelcome and unexpected. Not for the first or last time, I was reminded of a two-year-old hearing the word 'no' for the first time in their existence, and desperately trying to grasp such an alien concept.

“Four of the current ministers in the government are members of that club”, he said. “You should not stick your nose in where it is not wanted.”

“I dare say that the criminals whom I have helped secure convictions against felt much the same way”, Holmes said coolly. “Try again.”

“It is none of your concern”, his brother said loftily. Holmes smiled knowingly.

“Ah, but you must be wrong there, my dear brother”, he said. “You would not be here so swiftly if there was not something very irregular occurring at that establishment. And now.... I am even more curious!”

Mr. Bacchus Holmes scowled at him, then at me for some reason before huffing and making a dignified exit. 

“He would not try anything against you?” I asked worriedly. Holmes shook his head.

“Not that he would not like to”, he said. “But he knows that if anything happened to me and it was over a matter involving him, then the wrath of God would be as nothing compared to the wrath of Mother! Even Antarctica could not hide him!”

I smiled at that.

+~+~+

I was not totally surprised when, the next day, Holmes said that he was going round to visit his mother and father. He generally avoided his family as and where possible, and usually spent some days before each visit looking glum and depressed (and usually a further set of days thereafter looking much the same). This time, however, the visit was unannounced, although I had wondered whether the unwelcome fraternal incursion from the day before may have been behind it. He looked worried enough however, and I decided that it was not my place to ask.

Holmes, of course, knew.

“You are wondering about my having to go and see Father”, he said, over supper that evening.”

“It is family”, I said. “You have obligations, I suppose.”

He looked at me a little warily. He knew full well that whilst I missed my dear late mother, my father was both gone and (as much as was possible) best forgotten, and I suppose he felt a little guilty that he still had his parents. Even if one of them was the frankly terrifying Lady Rebecca. She had, Holmes had told me, insisted on a full check of both our current and first establishments (and their landladies!) by a private investigations agency.

“I thought that I may need Father's help in resolving this affair at the Tankerville Club”, he said. “He has certain contacts that are quite useful, at times like this. For example, he told me that the club is run by one Mr. Simeon Bennett, second cousin to Earl Charles. Mr. Simeon is, sad to say, an example of an apple that has fallen a long way from a noble tree.”

“A criminal?” I asked. Holmes shook his head.

“As Henriksen says, cynically but accurately, nobility like him are too wily to do what is actually criminal”, he said, sounding rather sorrowful, I thought. “No, he skates around the law but does not fall in.”

“Sounds like he needs a good push!” I said, trying to lighten the mood. Holmes stared at me.

“Yes”, he said slowly. “Maybe he does.”

I had the distinct impression that I had said something important, which was inevitably followed by the realization that any chance of my knowing what was so important was about as remote as the Dog Star.

+~+~+

A couple of weeks passed, and Holmes marked his thirty-fifth birthday. It was a generally cheerless time; that summer had been the wettest ever on record, and the poor weather had continued as we approached autumn. I did not get to spend the day with my friend, as his formidable mother had wanted him to accompany her to see a friend down in Devonshire. His hang-dog expression and the telegrams bemoaning his fate were cheering however, and I welcomed him back after a two-day absence by doing something that I had known he had long had planned, having his violin-case refurbished. He joked that he was so grateful that he would not torment me my playing, although I mostly found his music soothing enough. Except when he was unhappy, when it almost took on a life of its own in its utter misery and despair.

Despite his break, Holmes did not seem to be doing much as regards the Tankerville Club. I was therefore surprised when, shortly after his return, we had a visitor, one Mr. Simeon Bennett. He was a tall, balding fellow in his fifties, and like Mr. Bacchus Holmes clearly someone used to getting his own way by the disdainful manner in which he looked at first me and then our rooms. I suppressed a smile. This was going to be interesting.

“They say that you are a private detective”, he said, sounding dubious as to that fact.

“I am”, Holmes said equably. “In what capacity can I be of service, sir?”

There was the faintest hint of our visitor's own disdain in my friend's tone, and Mr. Bennett was clearly unused to getting his own attitude thrown back at him. He scowled, but continued.

“I am being followed”, he said. “I went to the police, but all they said was that they could not spare an officer to monitor me twenty-four hours of the day. Apparently I must be attacked and done to death first before they will actually lift a finger to help! So I came to you.”

“Has your life been threatened?” Holmes asked.

“No”, the man admitted, “but there is a man following me wherever I go.”

“Can you describe this 'man'?” Holmes asked.

“It is a different darkie every time”, our visitor said. “They all look alike to me.”

I winced inwardly. The man had done himself no favours at all with that slur, in the eyes of both of us.

“So a different person is following you each time, and the only connection is that they are a.... the colour of their skin?” Holmes asked. “It does not exactly sound threatening, sir. In a city of a million or more people, the odds on someone of that skin colour being in the same areas as yourself are quite high.”

“Maybe if I lived in the East End, perhaps”, our visitor said. “But I can tell you, the number of darkies around Chelsea is bloody damn few. Yet suddenly, they are all after me!”

Holmes frowned.

“Have you done something that would warrant such an interest?” he asked.

“Of course not!”

The briefest of pauses before he answered, but it was definitely there. Holmes shook his head.

“I serve clients from all levels of society”, he said, “but the one thing I expect from them is absolute honesty. You would not call on the services of Watson here, tell him only half your symptoms, and expect an accurate diagnosis. Unless you are completely honest with me, sir, you are wasting my time as well as your own.”

“I can see that!” our visitor said testily. “You have not heard the last of this, Mr. Holmes!”

With a curl of the lip, he was gone. I stared after him, worried.

“Can he do anything against you?” I asked. Holmes shook his head.

“He is all bluster”, he said. “He is only in charge of the Club because his noble cousin, in a rare moment of ill-judgement, wanted to give him something to do. Still, I think that it is time that we brought this matter to a head. I shall, regrettably, have to call on the offices of Mr. Khrushnic once more, as only he can obtain what I need.”

“Which is?” I asked.

“A body!”

I blinked in surprise.

+~+~+

Holmes looked even more tired than usual over breakfast that morning, and I did not hesitate before forking over all my rashers of bacon onto his plate. The look of undying gratitude that I received in return made me feel warm inside.

“Are you going into the surgery today?” he asked.

“I am not scheduled to”, I said, “although I suppose that I may get a call. Why?”

“I am expecting someone here at around mid-day”, he said. He seemed oddly unsure, which unnerved me slightly. “I would be grateful if you could be here to treat him, my friend.”

“Do you know what is wrong with him?” I asked. 

He thought for a moment before answering.

“Only that he will be in exceptionally poor physical condition”, he said. “Indeed, his mental needs may match or even outweigh his physical ones. I have a place for him to go to recover in the longer term, but he will need some immediate remedial work done on his body.”

“I shall be here when he comes”, I promised.

He smiled that grateful smile at me again, and I nearly let him have the rest of my breakfast as well!

+~+~+

My patient, whoever he was, arrived later than expected, and it was not until two o'clock that there was a knock at the door. Holmes went to open it, and outside stood two men, a tall black man and a shorter white one. Holmes handed a coin to the white man, who thanked him and left, then ushered the black man into the room. It was only when he came into the light of the window that I saw his true state.

I nearly retched.

“This is Mr. Benjamin Hope”, Holmes said quietly. “Do what you can for him, doctor. Henriksen and his friend, Mr. Edward Bell, will be here in about an hour.”

I fought down my nausea, and ushered the man over to the screen, bidding him disrobe. Even clothed, it was clear that he had suffered severe physical torture of the worst type imaginable. Whilst he was getting ready, I poured myself a strong drink, and followed it down with a second. I had a third ready as well.

I shall not further disturb the reader by graphically describing the poor man's broken body, safe to say that he must have been subjected to almost every physical abuse possible. How his frame, which in normal times must have been quite impressive, had not broken under such stress I did not know. Holmes had pointedly absented himself in his room, but he had left the door open so that we both knew that he was there. I was able to cleanse and make a start on healing the man's wounds, but he would indeed require many, many weeks away from 'civilization' to even begin to recover from his ordeal. What chilled me almost as much as his physical condition was the utter lifelessness in his eyes, as if he no longer cared about life at all.

The time passed much quicker that I had suspected, and I was still applying ointment to some minor cuts on the man's face when there was a second knock at the door. Henriksen appeared with what was presumably his and my patient's friend, 'Eddy'. The latter blundered into the room, and saw his friend's still naked body.

I hope never again to see two grown men cry.

+~+~+

“But how did you manage it?” I asked, as the three of us drove in a cab down to the Chelsea. Eddy and Benjamin had gone to the hospital that Holmes had chosen for the victim, out in the Essex countryside near the Epping Forest, where he would have the time he needed to recover.

“It seemed clear that, for some reason, someone at the Tankerville Club was abducting single young black men”, Holmes said. “I told Mr. Khrushnic that I needed Mr. Hope to be removed from the club for a case that I was working on, knowing that Mr. Simeon Bennett, whilst he himself eschewed any open criminality, would know who not to annoy. He presumably reckoned that Mr. Hope had committed some faux pas that had upset the crime lord somewhere down the line, and would soon be taking a terminal dip in the Thames. Instead, he and his friends will soon be recovering at their own pace from their terrible ordeal.”

“Friends?” Henriksen asked. Holmes nodded.

“It is not just your friend Eddy's road”, he said darkly. “The Tankerville Club has in the past year or so extracted some sixteen black men from the East End, for the sole purpose of torturing and abusing them.”

“But why?” I asked, mystified. “What could have driven them to such a foul set of acts?”

“You are forgetting that for some of these men the slave trade was abolished in their living memory”, Holmes said. “And as we see from some of the Mohammedan countries around the world, many people still see the act of demeaning and abusing those of a different skin complexion as some sort of God-given right. However, for the vile scum at the Tankerville Club, that 'right' ends right here!”

+~+~+

I do not think that I have seen as many policemen on one street since the relatively modest celebrations some two years back to mark Her Majesty's fortieth year on the throne. The burly doorman at the Club was brushed aside, and the matter was over in minutes. I found myself with Holmes, Henriksen, a black men (suited and in very good condition) and a very angry Mr. Simeon Bennett in the latter's plush offices.

“This is an invasion of my rights!” Mr. Bennett stormed. “The English police service have no right to enter foreign soil. I shall be communicating with the French government over this.”

Holmes sighed.

“It is a most fortunate thing that you are as ignorant historically as you are ideologically”, he sighed. “The French government has no jurisdiction here. Naturally, given the somewhat irregular circumstances, they were informed earlier today of the planned sequence of events, and they have given their consent to our actions. Not that we needed it, but it was politic to ask.”

“What do you mean?” Mr. Bennet demanded.

“Well”, Holmes said, “the 'peculiar' status of the land on which this Club stands was confirmed in a charter issued by King Henry the Sixth – or at least his guardians – in the year fourteen hundred and thirty-five.”

“So?”

“So”, Holmes said patiently, as if he were instructing a particularly slow schoolboy, “the wording of the charter states that the land becomes the property not of the King of France, but the titular Duke of Normandy. At that moment in history, Normandy had - briefly as it turned out - been returned to English rule. And as we all know, that title is current held by the queen as ruler of the bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. She has graciously granted her permission for your cousin the earl to sell this land and to use the money for somewhat better causes. On the other hand you, and Mr. Blake here, will be shortly enjoying somewhat less salubrious accommodation courtesy of the local jail.”

“We did nothing wrong”, the black man scowled.

“Deliberately luring away innocent young single black men, so you could abuse them in this foul way?” Holmes asked dryly.

“Do you think an English court would believe the word of a black man over a white one, Mr. Holmes?” Mr. Blake sneered.

Holmes sat back and smiled. I knew that look. He had something.

“Mr. Joseph Lake.”

Henriksen and I both looked as confused as we felt, but both Mr. Blake and Mr. Bennett looked as if they had been pole-axed. Holmes turned to us.

“As Mr. Blake so rightly says, proof is a difficult thing”, he said. “So for the past couple of weeks, the Club has enjoyed the free services of a budding young photographer, who had been providing its members with pictorial evidence of their 'achievements'. And for every photograph, there is always a negative.”

Mr. Blake moved to strike my friend, but Henriksen moved faster that I would have thought possible with his bulk, and floored the other man with a single punch to the jaw.

“That felt good!” he said. “Even if I may have broken a few of my own bones.”

“Doctor?” Holmes smiled.

+~+~+

The men rescued from the Club were dispatched to three places around London and, I am pleased to say, all made a full recovery. Since Mr. Blake had dual British and American citizenship, he was deported to the United States on the understanding that he would serve out his sentence there, which he duly did. The earl disowned his cousin, who was not released from jail for many a year. But on the day he finally walked free, it was not for long. He was found floating in the Thames two days later.

+~+~+

In our next adventure together, a call for help from a family friend of Holmes' takes us North of the Border, and an adventure that ends in a terrible, cold death for many people.


End file.
